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The Real World Finally Comes to Brooklyn

Oh, god, this really did happen, didn’t it? Yes, and the harbinger of urban cultural apocalypse on par with — well, with the arrival of a reality show at a downtown Manhattan loft in 1992, actually — anyway the season premiere was last night and, like the rubbernecker that she is, the L’s Andrea Rosen watched it and has agreed to share her notes on the end times.

I stopped watching The Real World in the middle of the Hawaii season, my 12-year-old self having determined that the cast had, in fact, stopped keepin’ it real. I’ve gathered from promos over the past decade that the show has mutated into a franchise of sorts — spawning some other cautionary series about tequila-fueled team building exercises.

This season, the cast is living in Red Hook. And because I’m unable to not watch any television show about or based in New York, I put away the sweet, sweet memories of Elka the virgin and Flora the fiery Latina and endured last night’s hour-long (it used to be half and hour, right?) premiere episode. Can the cargo-pantsed cast really stick to Brooklyn, or will they be doing Kamikaze shots in Midtown by midseason? Here are the cast’s reasons to stay in BK:

Viacom’s already stolen their dreams: Chet the Mormon says his dream job is to host TRL. Somewhere, Jesse Camp is giggling.
They can see New York from their house: The Statue of Liberty! The Brooklyn Bridge! Says Baya the Bohemian Babe, "We’re right on the ocean!" I guess technically the river feeds into a bay, which, in turn, feeds into the ocean! So cool!

Backdoor bragging is like the borough’s anthem: To whit, JD the Gay One tells us, "Some people think I’m a little arrogant because I go to a private university" and "I’m a dolphin trainer." It’s true, dolphins can SMELL YOUR EGO.
And waiting for a book deal is the borough’s full-time job: Sarah the Chick with Tattoos falls all over herself telling us she’s so excited all these new "characters" have entered her "book of life" and that "it’s gonna be the best story ever written." Next time on The Real World, Sarah finds out that Emily Gould has dibs on the tats-as-narrative-structure idea.

Homoerotic jam sessions are actually mandated by Marty Markowitz: Chet the Mormon and Ryan the Soldier take to the balcony and debate Chet’s sexuality IN SONG.

This season on The Real World: Crying! Living their dreams! Messy apartment!